5. Fertility Tables
What will you learn in this lecture:
- What data are needed to construct a fertility table.
- How to calculate mean generation time, intrinsic rate of increase and net reproductive rate from such a table.
- How to calculate half-life for shrinking populations and how to estimate the intrinsic rate of change using either life table or fertility table data.
- To consider why these estimates often differ.
Enrolled students of fall 2024 should watch this lecture before October 1.
What questions should you be able to answer now?
- What data do we need to create a fertility table? How is it similar and different from data for a life table?
- How can we calculate generation time?
- How is calculation of population doubling time similar to the calculation of half-life? How are they different?
- How does generation time influence a population's intrinsic rate of growth?
Useful links and materials:
Chapter 8 in: Krebs, Charles J. Ecology: The Experimental Analysis of Distribution and Abundance.
Featured image: The Venus of Dolní Věstonice suggests that prehistoric Moravians understood it was females who mattered in terms of population growth and fertility. Photo credit goes to Česká televize.